First Impressions from a Noob

Almost a month and half ago. I woke up one day and say, "I'd really like to start DJing/Remixing again." Going back to the mid 80's, I had a typical setup of two turntables, a mixer and a dream. With a small collection of albums, I produced a couple of "Master Mixes" and then promptly moved on to a host of other endeavors. And yes I am that old.

Fast forward to November 2010. I wake up and believe it would be cool to start mixing again. The initial plan is to go to a few music stores and figure out what I need within my budget (I started with $500). The first store I go to doesn't have much and the sales person realizes I don't want to spend enough to justify his time. I leave that place immediately. I'm at the second store for four hours and I walk out with a Numark Mixdeck, headphones, and few other items. I have spent more than double what I anticipated.

It's pretty rare that I buy something without copious amounts of research. Sure enough I get home to start looking at reviews and how to's. I have to say there's not a lot out there for this device. But almost instantly I start to hear about this Traktor Kontrol S4. I realize that for a little bit more than what I spent, I can have something that is more in line with what I want to do and of course the cool factor goes up a 100%. Within the week, I have taken back the Mixdeck and my Kontrol S4 is on order.

I have had my device for about five days now. I ordered Ean's Traktor Kontrol S4 video and I'm glad I did. I was up and working fairly quickly. The device itself is solid but something I would be really careful with. It certainly doesn't feel indestructible.

Installing the software is fairly painless but as recommended I didn't plug the device in until I had updated the software to the latest version. I believe after an hour, a semblance of music was coming from speakers. Overall, I believe the combination of software and hardware is brilliant. Remembering how much work it was to keep beats properly matched compared with how easy it is now means that I focus more on the music. Last evening I had 4 sample looks going with the two main decks and I was believeing to myself, "How cool is this?!?". The flip side to this is that I spend almost as much time configuring the actual songs as I do mixing them. Beat gridding is almost an artform all to itself. There are very few songs where the software gets it right immediately. Of course the payback is extremely tight mixes that don't wander off after a minute of play.

The jog wheels feel good with a certain weight and resistance to them. I know that other people have complained that there S4 was not working correctly but I have not had any issues with mine.

There are a few things that stand out as missing.

1) I wish I could get access to all 8 Cue Points with having to loose my sample decks. Four isn't enough. And I don't want to give up my sample decks to do it.

2) Hopefully soon I will be able to use my turntables with this mixer and more specifically the DVS functionality.

3) Beat Warping - I didn't know about this a week ago but if a song changes tempo that can be a problem.

I'm sure as I use the product more, I will add to my wishlist. Overall, I am extremely happy with my purchase. I saw a quote recently that said that the Traktor Kontrol S4 will turn Basic DJ's into good DJ's and good DJ's into great ones. I believe that all of the potential is there to make this happen. From my standpoint I believe this to be the case.

One last thing - I highly recommend Ean Golden's DVD. It answers and demonstrates visually many of the questions I had in my head as I start to learn this tool. The YouTube videos that NI has online are pretty good but obviously don't go into the same level of depth that Ean does. Great Job!

S4 Homer
Tim